


Complicated

by LokiOfSassgaard



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-29
Updated: 2012-03-29
Packaged: 2018-05-28 06:21:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6318124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LokiOfSassgaard/pseuds/LokiOfSassgaard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Relationships with the Doctor are always complicated. Doubly so if the other person in the relationship is also a time traveller.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Complicated

Most relationships are complicated. Some might even say that if the relationship isn’t complicated, it can’t rightly be called a relationship at all.

The best relationships, the ones that last forever, are always the most complicated. They last forever because they’re complicated. No one would care about Romeo and Juliet if the Montagues and the Capulets had been close and friendly with one another. Sherlock Holmes and John Watson would not have their relationship so mercilessly discussed had they just got it over with and shagged. Hugh Grant would have absolutely no career whatsoever if people fell in love and that was that.

It’s the complication and the puzzle of making it work regardless that makes people try at all. Relationships are an endless game of working out complexities of in-laws, balancing schedules, learning when to put the job second. Add a fourth dimension that allows your partner to move in time in a relative direction opposite to that which you’re moving, and well… you’re just asking for complication.

He doesn’t know when or where it happened (will happen); just that it had (has). He knew about it the first time he saw her; the last time she saw him, just before she died. At first, he thought it was a trick; some sort of trap for him. But then she showed up again, very much alive, and had no idea about the library. He knew her a little more, and she knew him a little less.

And it kept happening. Eventually, he knew, they would meet in the middle. They’d know exactly the same amount about one another’s respective futures until they’d begin to drift apart again, each making a journey toward the day where they’d meet the other for the first time. They’d both been on the end where they didn’t know the other, but to be the person who wasn’t recognised… that was scary. There must be some way to handle it. It must have happened before.

Of course it did. He remembers the look on her face when she realised that he had no idea who she was. He could see the hurt there, along with a resigned expectation of knowing it was bound to happen. At the time, he didn’t notice it for what it was; didn’t understand the situation.

Just as she wouldn’t when it came his turn.

He’s given up fighting it. He realised he’d given up fighting the inevitable the moment he accidentally proposed. At least, he thinks he proposed. That is, he asked if she was married, and she said yes. But not a regular yes. A somewhat scary yes.

Yeah, he probably proposed, now that he thinks about it. Maybe they can just be one of those quirky couples who stay engaged forever.

Only not, because she said yes.

He finds himself more and more excited to see her when she pops up. He even follows her lead and starts keeping a diary. Syncing his with hers very quickly becomes his favourite thing to do. It’s not long before he stops taking companions. He doesn’t need to any more. All he needs to do is go somewhere interesting and find her already waiting for him. He finds himself being more careful (if he could ever said to have been careful at all) and manages to not get himself killed for a bit longer than usual. Quite a bit longer, actually.

They do stupid couple things. He wears hats because he knows she hates them. She flirts with other men to watch him get jealous. But there’s also a trust between them. A trust that had surprised him when he realised it was there at all. Just as she’d trusted him to be there when she leapt out of an airlock, he trusts her to have the right intelligence and not lead him blindly into a trap.

He’s perfectly capable of wandering blindly into traps on his own. It’s just as well that she’s exceptionally good at keeping him out of them.

And if they still get into a spot of bother along the way? Well, that’s just the bit of added spice to keep things interesting.


End file.
